The Day After Thanksgiving continues to be a big deal in our house, and Chickadee may be the one who enjoys it the most! Even though Moose wasn’t marching in the town Santa parade this year, she still wanted to go…we had a lot of fun!
And she, Moose, and I went to the town square after dinner to check out the Christkindlmarkt, the gingerbread houses (Chickadee’s favorite was one inspired by Taylor Swift), and see the tree lighting. We also ran into Santa while we were there!
It’s such a great way to kick off the holiday season!
It’s finally time for a look back at all of the Festive Feasts we enjoyed over the holiday season, and all the baking we did!
Let’s start with Thanksgiving, which was our traditional turkey dinner with the addition of some delicious roasted fennel this year:
And a record-tying nine pies!
Our next big holiday was Nikolaustag, and it’s become a tradition for us to enjoy Döner kebab on that day (or, as was the case this time, several days later, once Bunny got home from college). We also had a gingerbread-based dessert as has become our custom…this time, I made gingerbread bars with a cream cheese frosting that were amazing!
On Santa Lucia Day, we enjoyed lussekattes for breakfast, and potato pancakes with smoked salmon and Kielbasa for dinner (a day early), plus an cranberry-orange layer cake with rosemary for dessert:
On Christmas Eve, we had a peppermint chip cake after church:
And coffee cake for breakfast on Christmas morning:
On Christmas Day, we had the best dinner of the year, the “pick out dinner.”
And then things got kind of messed up because I hurt my back. We postponed the fancy Christmas dinner we were supposed to have on the 27th, but we did manage to have our annual hot chocolate bar on New Year’s Eve:
And I also postponed the (different) fancy dinner we were supposed to have on New Year’s Day, but I did manage to make a gingerbread layer cake with molasses mousse filling and cinnamon whipped cream frosting, garnished with sugared cranberries:
On Ryan’s birthday (which was also Epiphany), I finally made the tenderloin that was supposed to be the star of our fancy Christmas dinner, plus s’mores pie for dessert:
Yesterday, I finally got around to the turkey dinner we were supposed to have on New Year’s Day. We also tried a new recipe for replica Starbucks’ cranberry bliss bars for dessert. I haven’t had the original, but Bunny tells me these are even better, because they don’t have that mass-produced flavor!
Before my back injury, we spent a few days baking our favorite Christmas cookies (and I put together a Bunter Teller!):
And we did eventually get around to the sugar cookies (not the gingerbread, though…we just ran out of time, but at least we had lots of other gingerbread desserts!):
I made kinderpunsch, wassail several times (not pictured), and eggnog over the course of the holiday weeks:
And then there were lots of other festive treats spread through the holiday season, from the weekend before Thanksgiving when we made soft pumpkin chocolate chip cookies to the Valentine’s Day Funfetti Bunny made for us before she went back to school (and also my first attempt at Dampfnudeln, which were amazing!):
By my count, we ended up short one fancy meal, because normally the tenderloin wouldn’t have been available for Ryan’s birthday dinner. We were also short the gingerbread cookies and the cannoli that I had hoped to make for New Year’s Day, since I simply didn’t have the strength or energy to do much the whole week between Christmas and New Year’s. It certainly wasn’t my best effort at holiday food, but at least I hit all the highlights, right?
Now that I’m feeling more like myself, it’s finally time for a look back at our Markel Family Christmas (and New Year’s) celebration!
But first, let me back up a bit. A few days before Christmas, I was trying to be helpful by assisting in moving a couch, and I ended up hurting my back. I managed to make it through the pain until the day after Christmas, when I finally gave in and went to the ER, where they said based on the x-rays, I had a bad muscle strain and a possible slightly slipped disc. Anyway, because of that, I had to tone done our celebration some, although Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were fairly normal.
Christmas Eve was fun because it was also Advent IV, which means we got to go to church in the morning, too!
There was our traditional Christmas Crunch to be had:
And the Fab Five finished the Lego Home Alone house:
And then we headed back to church for the Christmas Eve service, which was lovely as always!
We tried to stop by the St. Louis Christmas tree on the way home, as we have for the last few years, but there was simply no parking, so we went on our merry way, and drove though the Way of Lights only:
When we got home, I took pictures as always:
And we enjoyed a peppermint cake by the light of the fully lit Advent wreath:
I was really not feeling too well, so we didn’t play Ticket to Ride like we usually do, but I did find energy for Animal Crossing:
And I got the stockings filled with some help, and our Little People nativity scene set up:
On Christmas Day, we didn’t have to be up terribly early, so we took our time with stockings and coffee cake:
And then we headed back to church, for the third service in two days:
We managed a nice family picture even though I was still feeling pretty badly:
We took another shot at seeing the St. Louis Christmas tree on the way home, and it worked out perfectly, because there was no one there! It’s not quite the same as seeing it at night, but at least it was overcast!
When we got home, we opened presents:
And had our traditional “Pick out Dinner.”
Ryan’s parents were scheduled to arrive the day after Christmas, and I was going to make our fancy Christmas dinner the day after that. But I was feeling pretty horrible on the 26th, so the fancy dinner was postponed, and like I said, I went to the hospital, and have spent the better part of the week between Christmas and New Year’s doing absolutely nothing, including not making our fancy New Year’s dinner, either. We did have our New Year’s Eve hot chocolate bar, though:
And I managed to be awake on 12-31-23 (how cool was that date?!?) to ring in 2024 on my island (although I wasn’t sure at all that would happen!).
And I finally made the gingerbread cake that was supposed to be the ending to our fancy Christmas dinner for New Year’s Day!
This wasn’t exactly the Christmas I wanted, because I really felt like I let my family down, but I suppose it will be one we remember, anyway, and we still have two fancy dinners to look forward to!
Chickadee was very excited that Christmas Eve fell on a Sunday this year, because she got to wear both an Advent dress in all blue, and a new-to-her Christmas dress!
Here’s a look back at my “Festive Fashions” this Christmas…I got really lucky this year, because Christmas Eve and Advent IV fell on the same date, so I got to wear two different outfits to two different church services. For the morning service, I wore my Tassie-Aurea dress from Miss Candyfloss. I accessorized with a sparkly hair comb from Vixen by Micheline Pitt, my most sparkly Christmas brooch, and a pair of Splendette Duchess bangles. I wanted to wear my cape with this dress, but it was just too warm!
For the evening service, I wore a very old dress from Igigi that used to be my every-Christmas-Eve look. I haven’t worn it since before the pandemic, but I decided that since I got to go retro in the morning, evening was a good time to just go glam. I accessorized with the same brooch and hair comb, and switched out my Splendette stack.
After we got home, I changed into my dark green Miss Candyfloss Chantilly-Pine dressing gown, as is my Christmas Eve custom. I kept the brooch and hair comb, and switched out my Splendette stack again, and added my newest Splendette beads.
This morning, I wore my red Everyday Dirndl from Rare Dirndl with my new Christmas apron. I mixed up the accessories, wearing an Edelweiss wrap bracelet-as-choker, and a Splendette stack and earrings, plus a wintry floral crown:
I really love coming up with festive looks, and this year was especially fun!
For Christmas, I went for a fun, freeform pattern on my nails (because I didn’t want to mess with stripes again!) in Christmas colors, using Sally Hansen Miracle Gel “Me, My Elf & I” (green) and Holo Taco “Favourite Sister” (red).
It’s been quite a few years since we’ve been to “Christmas on the Hill,” and we missed it again this year, but we did go for a walk around The Hill on Wednesday to see the nativity scenes in the store windows and the decorations in the neighborhood. I always think it’s a beautiful place, but especially so at Christmas, and I’m pretty sure this is the first time we’ve seen Piazza Imo as the sun went down and the lights came on decorated for the holidays!
Time to take a look back at this year’s Christmas School!
I had a really difficult time coming up with a theme this year, and I was getting desperate, when an idea hit me…Christmas music! I started by choosing nine hymns (two Advent, six Christmas, and one Epiphany), and after reading the lyrics, we read about their origins and authors in Lutheran Service Book: Companion to the Hymns. (We also read Silent Night: The Wonderful Story of the Beloved Christmas Carol and Christmas in the Trenches on that hymn’s designated day.)
“Savior of the Nations, Come”
“The Angel Gabriel from Heaven Came”
“From Heaven Above to Earth I Come”
“Silent Night”
“What Child Is This?”
“O Little Town of Bethlehem”
“Lo How a Rose E’er Blooming”
“Where Shepherds Lately Knelt”
“As with Gladness Men of Old”
I came up with an original craft project to go with our hymn study. I bought some 4×4 inch wooden craft squares, and we each painted one for each of the hymns we studied. When we finished them, we attached them to a larger wooden square to resemble a quilt block of hymns. I was really happy with how the project went!
I also found a pretty and simple ornament craft that went perfectly with our theme. We didn’t even have to get out the glue gun!
In addition to our hymn study, we also learned about secular Christmas songs in the new book This is Christmas, Song by Song: The Stories Behind 100 Holiday Hits. There is a huge range of songs in this book by a wide variety of artists, and even I, the Christmas Queen, learned some things. We had a good time going through the selections and choosing our favorites to read about.
This week, we focused on reading Letters from Father Christmas, baking cookies, and watching The Nutcracker. In some ways, this was a much more low-key Christmas School than we usually have (since there was one big craft project, we didn’t have the variety of crafts we usually do), and I don’t think we read as many Christmas books (but we read more things from individual books). I didn’t even connect our cookie baking to the songs we read about (although I did try!), so we just baked all of our favorites. All things considered, though, I think it was a really fun Christmas School!
